BOSS

A "one-click" program for users that quickly optimises and avoids detrimental conflicts in their TES IV: Oblivion, Nehrim - At Fate's Edge, TES V: Skyrim, Fallout 3 and Fallout: New Vegas mod load orders.

Contents

1. Features & Introduction
2. Installation & Basic Usage
3. Uninstallation
4. General Usage
   1. The Graphical User Interface
   2. Keeping BOSS Up-To-Date
   3. The BOSS Log
   4. Dirty Edits, Mod Cleaning & CRCs
   5. False-Flagged Plugins
5. Contributions & Help
6. Further Details
   1. User Rules
   2. The BOSS.ini
   3. Command Line Arguments
   4. Updating Under Special Circumstances
   5. Running BOSS Under Linux
   6. BOSS Changes and Files
7. Troubleshooting
   1. General Problems
   2. File Permissions
   3. International Character Support
   4. Error Messages
8. Credits
9. Project Members
10. License
11. Quick Links
12. Version History

Features & Introduction

• Correctly positions over 22,100 mod plugins and counting for TES IV: Oblivion, TES V: Skyrim, Fallout 3, Fallout: New Vegas and Nehrim - At Fate's Edge.
  • Over 13,300 / 3,500 / 3,100 / 3,100 / 180 mod plugins respectively.
• Provides a large number of usage notes for many plugins, including requirements, incompatibilities, updates and bug warnings.
• Provides detection and warning of installation mistakes for some popular mods.
• Displays the version number of plugins when it is available.
• Provides Bash Tag suggestions that are automatically applied by Wrye Bash (for Oblivion and Skyrim), Wrye Flash (for Fallout 3), Wrye Flash NV (for Fallout: New Vegas).
• Sorts plugins ghosted by the Wrye *ash utilities.
• Allows easy user customisation of mod positions and the messages provided.
• Includes both CLI and GUI clients, offering full functionality and ease-of-use for all users.
• Includes a semi-automatic updater to ensure that the latest version is always installed.
• Is under constant development and improvement by a team of modders and experts on all supported games.

BOSS will re-order your mod plugins to their correct positions, putting any mods it doesn't recognise after them, in the same order as they were before BOSS was run.

BOSS is designed to assist in the usage of mods, helping mod users avoid serious conflicts. It is not a complete solution to load ordering issues, as there are far more mods out there than BOSS knows about. To properly place mods BOSS doesn't know about, a good working knowledge of mod load ordering for the relevant game is still necessary, for which some research and documentation reading will go a long way.

Installation & Basic Usage

Note that BOSS does not support Windows 2000 or earlier.

BOSS can be installed for use with TES IV: Oblivion, TES V: Skyrim, Fallout 3, Fallout: New Vegas and Nehrim - At Fate's Edge (a Total Conversion mod for Oblivion). Installation may either be automated, using the BOSS Installer package, or manually, using the archive package. Either method is simple, and instructions for manual installation are given below.

1. If upgrading from an earlier version of BOSS, delete all BOSS files and folders in all supported games' Data folders. Also delete any of the following from your BOSS folder(s) (but not from any folders within your BOSS folders): BOSSlog.txt; BOSSlog.html; masterlist.txt; modlist.txt; modlist.old.
   • If you have existing userlists, you will need to move them into the subfolders BOSS creates for their games in the BOSS folder when it is run. The installer does this automatically for you.
2. Within the archive you downloaded there is a BOSS folder. Extract this folder to a location of your choice. Make sure that you have the appropriate file permissions for the directory you choose. See the File Permissions section for more information.
   • If you only have one BOSS-supported game installed, it is best to install BOSS to the game's installation directory (ie. one of Oblivion, Fallout 3, Nehrim, fallout new vegas or skyrim depending on the game), so that the BOSS folder sits alongside the Data folder and the game's executable. This is referred to as a local install. BOSS by default will always run for the local game.
   • If you have more than one BOSS-supported game installed, it is best to install BOSS to a location outside of the supported games' installation directories. This is referred to as a non-local install. In a non-local install, BOSS by default lets the user choose which game to run for. This is the default install type when installing BOSS using the installer.
   • If you have multiple copies of the same game installed, then you must also copy the BOSS folder you installed to each instance of that game, apart from the original install, so that it is installed locally for each copy. These copies act as totally separate installs of BOSS, independent of each other and the 'main' BOSS install.
3. If any of the Wrye *ash utilities are installed, make sure their BOSS Disable Lock Load Order* setting is enabled.
4. In the BOSS folder, run BOSS.exe. This will download the latest masterlist from the Internet and then sort your mods.

Once BOSS has finished running, the output will be displayed automatically. Read any notes, errors if applicable, and make any relevant changes that are suggested by them. The Wrye *ash utilities will automatically import and apply Bash Tag suggestions from BOSS. Some Bash Tag suggestions can come with conditions and notes that require human intervention though, so read the suggestions makes thoroughly and adjust tags by hand in Wrye *ash if necessary.

Unrecognised mods must be re-ordered by hand using OBMM/FOMM or Wrye *ash.

Uninstallation

If BOSS was installed using the installer, then use the uninstaller it provides a link to in the Start Menu to uninstall BOSS. If BOSS was installed manually, do the following:

1. Delete the BOSS folder in the location you installed it to. If you installed BOSS to more than one location, delete each BOSS folder for each install of BOSS you wish to remove.

General Usage

This section gives more information on the parts of BOSS's functionality that users are likely to come into contact with during the course of general usage of BOSS. It gives details on the capabilities of the GUI, information on how to keep BOSS up to date, information on the BOSS Log and its constituent parts, and provides some background information and BOSS-specific notes on the subject of dirty edits and mod cleaning.

The Graphical User Interface

While the CLI provided by BOSS.exe offers the simplest way to run BOSS using just one click, the GUI provided by BOSS GUI.exe provides a way of accessing BOSS's options, settings and more powerful features without having to edit any other files manually. The CLI and GUI both possess the same core functionality, but differ in how they approach providing it, with the CLI being text-based and the GUI using graphical elements such as buttons, checkboxes and drop-down lists.

The GUI is composed of three major windows: the Main window, which is the one displayed when the GUI is run; the Settings window; and the User Rules Editor window. Their content shall be explained in turn.

When the GUI is run, it first attempts to detect which supported games are installed. If BOSS is installed locally to any supported game, the GUI will immediately load up the Main window. Otherwise, it will display a selection dialog so that the user may select which game it should run for. In this dialog, games that are not detected are labelled as such, and choosing one such game will cause the GUI to run in a limited mode, only allowing masterlist updating. See Updating Under Special Circumstances for when this may be useful. If a detected game is chosen, the GUI will run normally. Cancelling the selection dialog will cause the GUI to quit.

The Main Window

The title bar of the main window displays which game BOSS is running for: this may also be checked by seeing which game is selected in the Active Game menu.

The menu bar holds four menus: File, Edit, Active Game and Help. The File menu just contains commands for opening the BOSS Log, running BOSS and quitting. The Edit menu contains a command for editing user rules, which works the same as the Edit User Rules button, and a command for opening the settings window. The Help menu contains links to BOSS's documentation and copyright licenses, and commands to view the About dialog and to check for updates to the BOSS program (see the Keeping BOSS Up-To-Date section for details).

The Active Game menu allows you to change which game BOSS is running for without closing and re-opening the GUI. Games that BOSS does not detect as being installed are greyed out. The active game is marked with a dot next to it. To change the active game, simply select another game in the list. Setting the run type to Update Masterlist Only will un-grey all the games, allowing any of them to be selected, while changing from Update Masterlist Only to another run type will grey out undetected games again. If an undetected game is active when you change run type, BOSS will automatically switch to the first detected game in the list.

The output options on the left of the window tweak settings related to the BOSS Log. When the Display File CRCs option is enabled, the BOSS Log displays the CRCs of all the plugins in the Data folder, and of OBSE/FOSE/NVSE/SKSE and its installed plugins if present. The BOSS Log Format option decides both what format of BOSS Log is generated when BOSS is run and what format of BOSS Log the GUI opens when the View BOSS Log button or File→View BOSS Log menu item is selected. Display Plugin Versions and Show BOSS Log On Completion do exactly as they say on the tin.

The run options on the right of the main window decide how BOSS runs. BOSS has three main modes of operation that are mutually exclusive to one another: it can either sort your plugins, only update your masterlist then quit or undo its changes to your load order. When Update Masterlist is enabled, BOSS will update your masterlist before sorting your plugins. When Perform Trial Run is enabled, BOSS simulates its changes to your load order without actually reordering your mods. The Undo Level option allows you to select how many runs of BOSS are to be undone.

The Edit User Rules button opens your userlist for editing. If the Use User Rules Editor setting in the Settings window is enabled, clicking the button will open the User Rules Editor window, otherwise it will open your userlist in your default text editor. The Run BOSS button runs BOSS's main sorting/updating/undoing functionality according to the options selected. The View BOSS Log button does exactly what it says on the tin, opening the BOSS Log in the format selected in the Output Options section.

The Settings Window

BOSS has a large number of settings, only a few of which can be displayed in the main window. As such, the less commonly used settings are found in the Settings window, which can be accessed by clicking Edit→Settings... in the main window's menu bar. The settings are grouped into tabs depending on what area of BOSS's behaviour they control. The settings are detailed in the table below.

Each setting in the GUI corresponds to a command line parameter and/or an ini setting, the details of which can be found in the Command Line Arguments and Customising How BOSS Works sections of this ReadMe respectively.

The User Rules Editor

The User Rules Editor can be used instead of editing your userlist.txt directly. The information contained within the BOSS User Rules ReadMe document is still required to understand user rules. The editor comprises of the following elements:

• User Rules:
  • This section lists your user rules in order.
  • Rules that are currently enabled have their checkboxes checked, whereas disabled rules are unchecked. Rules are disabled using the DISABLE keyword.
  • Rules can be moved up or down by selecting a rule and using the Move Up and Move Down buttons at the bottom of the window.
  • When the User Rules Editor is loaded, it will automatically disable any rules adding mods that are already in the masterlist.
• Installed Mods/Masterlist tabs:
  • The Installed Mods tab lists the plugins found in your Data folder. Plugins are listed in the order that they are loaded. All plugins installed are displayed, not just those in your currently active load order.
  • The Masterlist tab displays the masterlist as a tree list, showing plugins and groups. The tree list is by default fully collapsed. Double clicking on a collapsed group (any row without a .esp or .esm in its name) will expand that group, showing its children. Double clicking an expanded group will collapse it again, hiding its children.
  • Selecting a plugin in the Masterlist tab's list will cause the messages attached to it by the masterlist to be displayed in the Masterlist Mod Messages section.
  • Either list may be searched using the search box at the top of each tab. Searching looks for matches from the start of plugin and group names, searching for xul would return all plugins and groups with names that start with xul. Searches are performed when the Enter keyboard key is pressed, and may be cancelled by clicking the grey cross that appears in the search box.
  • A plugin or group may be selected frm either list and drag 'n' dropped into a text box in the Rule Creator/Editor to add that plugin or group to the text box, rather than having to write out its name.
• Masterlist Mod Messages:
  • This section displays the messages attached to the currently selected mod in the Masterlist section. The messages are displayed as they appear in the masterlist, not as they appear in the BOSS Log. See the BOSS User Rules ReadMe for a brief overview of the most common message syntax, and the BOSS Masterlist Syntax documentation for the full details.
  • The messages cannot be edited here: they must be replaced or added to via a user rule in the Rule Creator/Editor.
• Rule Creator/Editor:
  • This section is where the user edits or creates user rules. Selecting a rule in the User Rules list will load it into this section.
  • The rule object is specified in the first text box. This is the plugin or group that the rule acts upon.
  • If the rule object is to be sorted, the object it is sorted relative to must be specified in one of the two text boxes in the Sort Item subsection, depending whether the user is sorting the object relative to another, or inserting a mod into a group.
  • Messages for addition or to replace existing messages should be written in the large text box. They must use valid syntax.
  • To add the current contents of the Rule Creator/Editor as a new rule, use the Create New Rule button. To save edits to the selected rule in the User Rules list, use the Save Edited Rule button. The User Rules Editor will ask for confirmation before applying the edits.
  • To delete the rule selected in the User Rules list, use the Delete Rule button. The User Rules Editor will ask for confirmation before deleting the rule.
  • The User Rules Editor will catch most, if not all, syntax errors in created and edited rules and warn the user of the errors encountered. No invalid rules will be saved.

To save your changes to your userlist and exit, use the Save button. To exit without saving, use the Cancel button.

Plugins and groups may be added to the text boxes in the Rule Creator by dragging and dropping them from the Installed Mods and Masterlist lists on the right of the window. Dropping a plugin or group into a text box currently containing a plugin or group will cause the existing text to be replaced.

The User Rules Editor ignores all silent comments in your userlist.txt, and will strip them from the file if you choose to save your user rules via the editor.

Keeping BOSS Up-To-Date

It is important that you keep your BOSS installation updated, not only to benefit from the many frequent updates made to the masterlists, but also to benefit from bug fixes, improvements and new features introduced to new releases of BOSS itself.

Providing there is an Internet connection available when BOSS runs, it will automatically download and apply any updates available for the masterlist of the game it is running for by default. BOSS will also check for new releases and if an update is available it will notify the user, displaying release notes if any are available. Additionally, if you installed BOSS using the automated installer, BOSS will ask the user if they wish to update, and automatically download and run the updated version's installer if so. The check for new releases functionality behaves as outlined below:

1. On launching, it automatically checks for updates to BOSS. If an update is found, it proceeds to the next step. If no update is available, or no Internet connection is present, it will display no message.
   • If you run the Check For Updates option from the GUI's Help option, then it will display messages detailing if no update was found or if there were any errors.
2. No matter how the update check was started, if an update is available it will notify the user, asking whether or not to download and install the update if BOSS was installed using the automated installer. If the user decides not to update, the updater will quit.
3. If the user decides to update, then it will begin downloading the new installer to the BOSS folder, displaying the progress. If using the GUI, the download can be cancelled at any time, in which case any downloaded file will be deleted and the updater will quit. CLI users can cancel the download by quitting BOSS, but no cleanup will take place.

Under certain circumstances the masterlist and program updaters may be unable to function correctly. If you have issues using them, see the Updating Under Special Circumstances section for alternative methods.

BOSS program updates are also published at the TES Nexus, Skyrim Nexus, Fallout 3 Nexus and New Vegas Nexus BOSS pages. For those not using the masterlist updater, the latest masterlist is always on the Google Code repository.

Always make sure to use the latest version of BOSS and the latest masterlist.

The BOSS Log

The BOSS Log is where you will find all of BOSS's outputted information. It can be generated in either HTML format (the default) or as a plain text file with minimal formatting. The HTML format has significant advantages over the plain text format, being considerably easier to read, containing colour-coded messages and a variety of filters to customise what is displayed. However, other than the HTML BOSS Log providing a notification if there has been no change in the recognised mod list since last run, there is no difference in information provided between the two formats.

The HTML BOSS Log has been tested in Mozilla Firefox 10, Google Chrome 17, Opera 11 and Internet Explorer 9. Using earlier browsers may result in parts of the BOSS Log not working or displaying correctly.

The BOSS Log comprises of a number of sections, which are detailed in the table below.

BOSS will display the version numbers of any plugins that provide them in their description fields. If a plugin supplies no version number, it cannot be displayed. The version numbers may not reflect the actual version of the mod installed - this could either be due to the mod author forgetting to update the description, or due to a mistake in BOSS's detection. As version numbers are supplied by mod authors in a wide range of formats and BOSS has to detect as many as possible, it occasionally identifies parts of some descriptions as version numbers incorrectly. This is largely unavoidable, but any discrepancies should be reported to the BOSS team in case they can be fixed. When in doubt, check the version number given in a mod's readme.

It should be noted that the vast majority of BOSS's mod messages are non-conditional, in that they are not displayed in response to your specific install. For example, a message that gives some of the mod's incompatibilities does not know if you have them installed or not, and a message telling you to do something will not know if it has been done.

BOSS's mod messages are one of the most important features BOSS provides, acting as a means of providing users with information that they might otherwise not obtain. It is important for a stable, healthy game that you act on any messages that require action. If you think a message suggests an action that is not necessary, report it to an official BOSS thread.

The HTML BOSS Log includes a few features and a number of filters to customise what is displayed. The majority of these are found in the shaded box near the top of the BOSS Log, and are enabled and disabled via their checkboxes:

The number of plugins and messages hidden at any one time are displayed below the filters box in italics. In addition to the above filters, clicking on a section's title will collapse that section, hiding its contents. Clicking the title again will expand the section, making its contents visible again.

It is not possible to hide mod warning or error messages, as these are of a severity where they should almost certainly be acted upon, and not ignored. Be aware that if you hide all a mod's messages and then hide all messageless mods, that mod will be amongst those hidden.

Dirty Edits, Mod Cleaning & CRCs

Dirty edits are often a side-effect of mod creation, and are often due to bugs in the utilities Bethesda has provided to create mods, rather than bad practice by mod authors. Dirty edits can cause a wide range of issues, including incorrect game settings, missing content, broken quests and crashing to desktop. The more dirty edits there are, and the more mods with dirty edits you use, the more likely you are to experience issues.

Thankfully there is a way to remove dirty edits from mods relatively easily, a process known as mod cleaning, using TES4Edit (for Oblivion), FO3Edit (for Fallout 3), FNVEdit (for Fallout: New Vegas) or TES5Edit (for Skyrim). A detailed set of instructions and information on mod cleaning can be found on the CS Wiki's TES4Edit Cleaning Guide (the page also applies to Fallout 3 Fallout: New Vegas and Skyrim). Wrye *ash can also scan plugins for dirty edits and return their ITM and UDR counts, though at the time of writing it cannot clean plugins itself.

The problem of dirty edits is largely a problem of ignorance on the part of mod authors and users alike of the problems unclean mods (more widely known as dirty mods) can cause. As such, there are community efforts to raise awareness of dirty edits and cleaning. BOSS plays a key role in these efforts, as it holds the complete list of all known dirty mods, and it uses this information to provide notification messages to users for any dirty mods they have installed. There are three key pieces of information that are used to accurately describe and identify an unclean mod. They are:

• ITM Count: ITM records are a type of dirty edit where a mod has overwritten something in the game without actually changing anything. If another mod lower in the load order makes an intentional change to that thing, it will have its effect cancelled out by the ITM record, which can cause problems. The ITM count is the number of ITM records found and corrected in the mod plugin.
• UDR Count: Deleting records is a significant cause of crashes and game bugs. UDRs are records that the mod deleted from the game or from another mod that have been corrected safely by undeleting them and disabling them instead, which has the same intended effect without causing issues. The UDR count is the number of deleted reference records found and corrected in the mod plugin.
• CRC or Checksum: A file's CRC is a highly accurate way of identifying it, and is a number calculated from the file's contents. If the contents of a file changes, so will its CRC. BOSS uses CRCs to check if a user's mods are dirty by checking their CRCs against pre-determined CRCs of known dirty mods. This lets BOSS give precise notification messages for any dirty mods it detects. BOSS can calculate the CRCs of all your installed plugins if run from the GUI with the Display File CRCs option enabled.

However, not all unclean mods have all or any of these pieces of information. For unclean mods whose ITM and UDR counts have not been reported, BOSS cannot give them. For unclean mods whose CRCs have not been reported, BOSS cannot give precise notification and so prints a message whether or not the user has cleaned their mod.

BOSS and the modding communities rely on user contribution of this information to progress. For information on how to contribute, see the Contributions & Help section below. If you find that a mod is dirty, you should also report this to the mod's author so that they can fix it.

Note: TES4Edit et al. will include a variety of junk records in the ITM count for a plugin, such as new empty cells that are automatically generated by the Construction Set and are almost impossible to remove. These junk records are non-harmful, and BOSS will inform users when a mod contains these to avoid confusion. This is also the source of any discrepancies between the counts produced by TES4Edit and those produced by Wrye *ash. The latter's counts are more technically accurate, but both are acceptable for use.

There is also another type of unnecessary edit, known as a wild edit, that can also cause problems. These edits are neither Identical To Master edits nor deleted records, so cannot be automatically cleaned. Cleaning must be manually done in TES4Edit/FO3Edit/FNVEdit. BOSS can still check for plugins with these edits if the CRCs of the plugins with wild edits are known, and it can provide notification of these edits and some information on fixing them if they are reported in an official BOSS thread.

False-Flagged Plugins

Whether a mod plugin is a master file or a non-master file is dependent not on its file extension (.esp, .esm), but is instead decided by the value of a setting inside the plugin file, known as its master bit flag. Master files have this set to 1, and non-master files have it set to 0. However, because ESM is an acronym for Elder Scrolls Master, and ESP is an acronym for Elder Scrolls Plugin (even for Fallout 3 and Fallout: New Vegas), most people assume that master plugins are files with .esm extensions, while non-master plugins are files with .esp extensions.

This assumption is valid for the most part, as the vast majority of masters are .esm files, and the vast majority of plugins are .esp files. However, sometimes this is not the case. When a plugin has a .esm extension but has a master bit flag value of 0, or has an extension of .esp and a master bit flag value of 1, the plugin is said to be false-flagged, as its extension does not match its master bit flag value. False-flagged plugins are most common in Fallout 3 due to the use of FO3Edit's Master Update feature, which turns non-master plugins into false-flagged plugins, to avoid bugs that only manifest for non-master plugins.

The distinction between masters and non-masters is important for load order because the game will always load all masters before all non-masters, regardless of whether they are listed or dated (depending on your game) as such by the mechanism used to determine load order. Earlier versions of BOSS, and most if not all mod managers, put all .esm files before all .esp files, but failed to take into account the value of the master bit flag of plugins. As such, the load order they displayed was incorrect, as it failed to take into account the game always loading masters before plugins.

Since the master bit flag can be changed by users, it is not sufficient to update the masterlists to take into account the values of plugin master bit flags in the plugins available for download, as the user may have changed the master bit flag values (eg. using FO3Edit's Master Update). As such, BOSS instead checks that the masterlist used is ordering masters before non-masters, and moves any masters loading after non-masters so that they load before non-masters. If any masters are moved, it then displays a message in the BOSS Log to notify the user of this change. The BOSS Log does not detail which masters were moved.

Contributions & Help

General discussion, and the submission of questions, suggestions and unrecognised or unclean plugins, takes place in BOSS's official threads for Oblivion, Nehrim, Skyrim, Fallout 3 and Fallout: New Vegas.

User contribution of additions and corrections to the masterlist are vital to the upkeep of BOSS. Let us know what you know.

Lists of unrecognised plugins are welcome but the only way we can include them in the database in a timely way is if we get:

• The ESP/ESM file name(s).
• A link to where the description, mod or readme can be found to read or download.
• A brief description of each mod will also help. Feel free to make load order suggestions.

Lists of unclean plugins are also very welcome, but for the report to be most useful we require:

• The ESP/ESM file name(s).
• The number of records removed (the ITM count) as shown by TES4Edit/FO3Edit/FNVEdit or Wrye *ash (not the number of records processed).
• The number of records undeleted (the UDR count) as shown by TES4Edit/FO3Edit/FNVEdit or Wrye *ash (not the number of records processed).
• The CRC(s) of the unlcean ESP/ESM file name(s). Make sure that the CRCs are of the uncleaned files, not the files after cleaning. The CRC(s) may be calculated using BOSS, Wrye *ash or 7-zip, with other sources being unverified as correct. In the case of 7-zip, the CRC checksum for data is the one required.

Advanced Usage

This section gives information on how to operate BOSS under certain conditions, how to customise its behaviour more fully than previously covered, and provides details for all the BOSS files.

User Rules

Users can customise how BOSS handles their plugins through the included User Rules feature. This feature allows you to define the positions of plugins not in the masterlist, and to override the masterlist positions of plugins, as well as edit the output messages of plugins, and more. In addition, this is all done without editing the masterlist.txt, so when you update it using the built-in updater, your changes are not lost. All the information on the User Rules feature can be found in the BOSS User Rules ReadMe file that accompanies this ReadMe.

The BOSS.ini

Users can edit all of BOSS's settings in the BOSS.ini. As this is where BOSS gets its settings from when both running the CLI client and when loading the GUI client, care must be taken to edit it correctly to prevent breaking BOSS's operation. If BOSS is run and it cannot find a BOSS.ini, it will generate a new one with default settings. If BOSS is run with both a BOSS.ini present and command line parameters set, the command line parameters override the settings in BOSS.ini. The ini is split into the following sections:

BOSS.GeneralSettings

These settings control miscellaneous areas of BOSS's operation outside of the main sorting functionality.

BOSS.InternetSettings

These settings control how the masterlist updater and GUI auto-updater connect to the Internet. They are shared by BOSS.exe and BOSS GUI.exe, and can be overriden for the masterlist updater using BOSS's command line parameters. They may also be edited through the GUI. You will probably know if you need to alter them.

BOSS.RunOptions

These settings specify BOSS's run options. They allow you to run BOSS with non-default settings without having to use the command line or the GUI.

BOSSLog.Filters

These settings control the default states of the BOSS Log filters. If a filter's default is set to be enabled, then it will be enabled and applied when the BOSS Log is opened. These settings are all boolean switches, so true enables them and false disables them. By default all filters are disabled. See the earlier The BOSS Log section for what each filter does.

BOSSLog.Styles

These settings control the BOSS Log's CSS styles, used to provide the formatting for the BOSS Log. A knowledge of CSS is expected if you wish to alter these settings. If you do not possess such knowledge, altering these settings is not recommended.

Command Line Arguments

While the BOSS GUI allows you to specify options using its graphical elements, the CLI uses a combination of the BOSS.ini file and command line arguments to do the same. The syntax for these arguments is: boss [-hVuosndctUl] [-g [game]] [-r [level]] [-v [level]] [-f [type]] [-H [hostname]] [-P [port]] -h [ --help ]

This prints a short description of BOSS and some information on the function of the command line arguments, then exits. -V [ --version ]

Prints the a banner displaying the program name and version number to the command line, then exits. -u [ --update ]

Automatically updates the local copy of the masterlist using the latest version on the Google Code repository, and then sorts your plugins. This behaviour is enabled by default, so the command line parameter will have no effect except when the automatic masterlist updating has been disabled in the ini. -U [ --no-update ]

Inhibits the default automatic masterlist updater, preventing it from running. Must not be used alongside --update,-u. -o [ --only-update ]

Automatically updates the local copy of the masterlist using the latest version on the Google Code repository, and then does not sort your plugins. -g [ --game ] [ game ]

Overrides game autodetection. The valid values of the argument are: Oblivion, Nehrim, Fallout3, FalloutNV and Skyrim. If the game specified is not detected, BOSS falls back to autodetection, unless -o is also passed, in which case BOSS will run successfully whether or not the game is installed. -s [ --silent ]

Stops BOSS from automatically opening up the BOSS Log in your web browser (or text editor, depending on format chosen) after it has finished running. -c [ --crc-display ]

Calculates the CRCs of all the plugins in your Data folder, including OBSE/FOSE/NVSE/SKSE plugins, and displays them in your BOSS Log alongside the plugin names. -n [ --no-version-parse ]

Disables the parsing of each plugin's description to extract the author's version information, so it is not printed alongside the other data in the BOSS Log. This can be used if the version parsing is not working properly for some of your plugins and you wish to remove the version notes. -f [ --format ] [ type ]

Allows the selection of the BOSS Log format. Valid argument values are: html and text. html is the default output format. The text value will print the BOSS Log as plain text into a 'BOSSlog.txt' file, similar to the BOSS Log in BOSS v1.5 and below. -t [ --trial-run ]

BOSS runs, but no plugins are redated, so your load order is not changed. The BOSS Log still displays the order BOSS would have placed them in, so it is useful for checking what would happen if you ran BOSS on your load order without having to then undo BOSS's changes. -r [ --revert ] [ level ]

Revert to a previous load order. This parameter optionally accepts values of 1 or 2, indicating how many undo steps to apply. If no option is specified, it defaults to 1. A value of 1 will restore the load order to that stored in modlist.txt. A value of 2 will restore the load order to that stored in modlist.old. If the modlist that you are reverting to does not exist, BOSS will cancel the undo and display an error message. The modlist files are not updated when BOSS is run with this parameter. -v [ --verbose ] [ level ]

Specify the verbosity level (0 to 3) of the debugging output. 0 is the default, showing only warning and error messages. 1 (warning, error and informational messages) is implied if this option is specified without an argument. Higher values increase the verbosity further. -d [ --debug-with-source ]

Adds source file references (filenames and line numbers) to debugging statements. -l [ log-debug ]

Logs the debug output to the BOSSDebugLog.txt file instead of the command line. -H [ --proxy-host ] [ hostname ]

Sets the proxy hostname for the masterlist updater. The hostname may be an actual hostname (eg. proxy.company.com), an IP address (eg. 192.168.32.4) or none. none is the default, and is equivalent to there being no proxy. -P [ --proxy-port ] [ port ]

Sets the proxy port number for the masterlist updater. The port number may be any valid port number. 0 is the default, and is equivalent to there being no proxy.

Updating Under Special Circumstances

The vast majority of users will be able to use BOSS's masterlist updater and the auto-updater with no problems. However, some users' circumstances may be such that the standard method will not work. This section provides instructions for those users.

The most common special circumstance is when the computer the user has BOSS installed on is not connected to the Internet. In this circumstance, the following instructions should be used to obtain masterlist updates:

1. Copy BOSS GUI.exe from your BOSS folder to the computer with an Internet connection.
2. Run BOSS GUI.exe and choose the appropriate game when prompted.
3. Make sure that the GUI is set to the Update Masterlist Only run option.
4. If you use a proxy to connect to the Internet, also record your proxy settings in the relevant part of the GUI's Settings window.
5. Select Run BOSS. The masterlist will be downloaded into a subfolder, named after the game you selected, in the same location as your BOSS GUI.exe. Some other BOSS files will also be created, you can safely delete these.

A rarer circumstance is when the user connects to the Internet using a proxy. This is most common in enterprise environments, and such users will generally know if they use a proxy. If you use a proxy to connect to the Internet, you must either record your proxy settings in the relevant part of the GUI's Settings window or manually enter your proxy settings into your BOSS.ini settings file. See the Customising How BOSS Works section above for details on the expected settings.

If your circumstances are such that the computer you have BOSS installed on is not connected to the Internet, or if you use a proxy to connect to the Internet, it is recommended that you avoid using the auto-updater, simply because it is easier in these circumstances to download new releases through your web browser.

There may also be other special cases which cause problems for BOSS's updaters that the BOSS team is unaware of. If you are having issues using the updaters, contact the BOSS team for support.

Running BOSS Under Linux

It is possible to run BOSS on Linux through the Wine compatibility layer, though no official support for doing so is given. Installation and usage is as on Windows. It is also possible to compile BOSS natively for Linux, although there is again no official support for doing so. Native Linux builds are case-sensitive in their recognition of plugins in the masterlist, and while plugins are generally added with the correct case, occasionally a plugin might have the incorrect case which would cause problems for a user with a native Linux build.

BOSS Changes and Files

The only changes BOSS makes to your game install are to re-date the .esp and .esm files in your Data folder, and create a few files in your BOSS folder. Your game's master file (Oblivion.esm, Nehrim.esm, Fallout3.esm, FalloutNV.esm or Skyrim.esm) is never altered, and all dates are derived from it.

Note: Skyrim v1.4.26+ uses a different load order mechanism to earlier games and versions of Skyrim. It uses the order of plugins in its plugins.txt file (found in the user's local application data folder) to determine load order instead of plugin timestamps. As such, when running for Skyrim v1.4.26+, BOSS will not alter any plugin timestamps but will instead alter the order of the contents of your plugins.txt file.

BOSS stores all its files in the BOSS folder. BOSS's files are detailed in the table below (images for this readme are omitted).

Troubleshooting

Although BOSS is simple to use, it has grown to become a relatively complex application. As such, there are some circumstances under which BOSS may not be able to run correctly, due to a variety of possible reasons. In such cases, an error message detailing the problem should be provided. If the program unexpectedly crashes, or you experience a problem for which no error message is given, please report the crash or problem to an official BOSS thread (linked to in the Quick Links section below), so that we may fix it.

If the information below does not help you to solve any problems you are experiencing, please seek further support in one of the official BOSS threads.

General Problems

There are a few general reasons why BOSS may fail to function correctly. Check if any of the symptoms listed below fit your issue.

• Symptom: No change in load order.
  • Issue: Wrye *ash's Lock Load Order* load order locking feature is enabled, but BOSS Disable Lock Load Order* is not.
  • Solution: Enable Wrye *ash's BOSS Disable Lock Load Order* setting.
  • Issue: You are running BOSS for Skyrim and checking the load order using a utility that has not been updated to work with Skyrim's textfile-based load order system.
  • Solution: Update your utility to a version that works with the textfile-based load order system, or use Skyrim's launcher to view load order. Editing load order in Skyrim's launcher is not recommended as it does not record load order data for inactive plugins.
• Symptom: When viewing load order in Skyrim's launcher, some plugins are deactivated and moved to the bottom of the list.
  • Issue: BOSS lists plugins in load order using their names in the masterlist, which can be in the wrong case. Skyrim's launcher is case-sensitive when it reads load order, so any plugins listed with incorrect cases will be removed from the load order. Skyrim itself is case-agnostic, so will load plugins listed with incorrect cases.
  • Solution: Report the deactivated plugins with their correct cases to the BOSS Development Team so that the case in the masterlist can be corrected.
• Symptom: BOSS does not recognise the plugins in my userlist correctly, and/or replaces some of the letters in their names with question marks.
  • Issue: Your userlist is not encoded in UTF-8.
  • Solution: Save your userlist in the UTF-8 encoding.
  • Issue: You had plugins in your userlist with non-Latin letters in their names, and saved your userlist in a non-UTF8 encoding before saving it in UTF-8.
  • Solution: Rewrite the filenames in your userlist, copy/pasting them from the files themselves to ensure they are correct.
• Symptom: Some plugins have the wrong or no version number given in the BOSS Log.
  • Issue: This occurs because BOSS looks for the version number in the plugin's description field. If the plugin author has forgotten to update the version number there or not provided one, an incorrect or no version number will be displayed.
  • Solution: No solution, other than the plugin author including a correct version number in the plugin's description field for a later release.
• Symptom: You get an error message of the form There is a problem sending the command to the program.
  • Issue: This is a Windows error unrelated to BOSS that may occur when it tries to open your BOSS Log (or another file, but most commonly reported for the BOSS Log).
  • Solution: The exact cause is unknown, but make sure that you have the default program for HTML files set to your web browser, using the Control Panel settings. If your default program is set correctly, then restarting your computer will probably fix the issue.
• Symptom: Text boxes in the GUI's User Rules Editor are invisible or displayed without a border.
  • Issue: Something is wrong with how the User Rules Editor window is drawn. The cause is currently unknown.
  • Solution: Hovering your mouse over where the text boxes should be will cause them to refresh and be displayed correctly.
• Symptom: The BOSS Log labels plugins as active incorrectly on Windows Vista or Windows 7.
  • Issue: For some reason BOSS is finding it difficult to read which of your plugins are active, due to a lack of permissions.
  • Solution: Running BOSS as an Administrator will allow it to read which of your plugins are active properly.
• Symptom: Skyrim is installed, but BOSS cannot detect it when installed non-locally.
  • Issue: The Registry entry for your Skyrim install is missing. This can occur if Steam's Verify Integrity Of Game Cache function is used.
  • Solution: Running Skyrim's launcher will add the Registry entry back in, allowing BOSS to detect Skyrim correctly.

File Permissions

If you are running Windows Vista or Windows 7, BOSS (and other modding programs) may be prevented from working correctly by the UAC security feature. There are four common workarounds to this problem:

1. Install the game outside the Program Files (or Program Files (x86) if on 64-bit Windows). UAC prevents unauthorised edits to these folders, so by installing the game outside of them, you remove it from UAC's reach, allowing you to use mods more easily.
2. Deactivate UAC. This can be done from the Control Panel, and will turn UAC off across the whole of your computer. It is up to you whether you feel that you have adequate security measures in place to do this without risk.
3. Give yourself Full Control permissions over your game install folder. This will allow you to make any edits you desire while keeping UAC active and on guard for any edits made by programs you do not run, and also means that you do not need to reinstall your game to a new location.
4. Run BOSS as an Administrator. Right-click the BOSS.exe and BOSS GUI.exe, and select Run as administrator.

For those that wish to take the third option and give themselves Full Control permissions, here is a guide:

1. Right-click the folder you wish to change the permissions for, and select Properties.
2. In Properties, select the Security tab, and click the Edit... button. A UAC prompt may appear, simply allow yourself to continue.
3. In the Group or user names box, select the Users option.
4. In the lower box, check the box opposite Full Control in the Allow column. Press OK to exit. If a UAC prompt appears, allow the change.
5. In the Properties window, select OK to exit. You should now have Full Control permissions over your chosen folder.

International Character Support

BOSS provides support for sorting plugins containing characters from any language via the Unicode character encoding, specifically UTF-8. All BOSS's files are encoded in UTF-8 by default. However, if you created your userlist.txt before BOSS automatically created one, you will probably need to convert it to the UTF-8 encoding, as it is not Notepad's default encoding. Below are some instructions for converting a file's encoding to UTF-8:

• Using Notepad:
  1. Open the file in Notepad.
  2. Open the File menu, then select Save As....
  3. In the Save As dialog window that opens, there is a drop-down list labelled Encoding:. Select UTF-8 from this list. Do not select any of the other Unicode encodings, they will not work.
  4. Click the Save button, answering Yes to any confirmation prompts.
• Using Notepad++:
  1. Open the file in Notepad++.
  2. Open the Encoding menu, then select Convert to UTF-8.
  3. Save the file as normal.

A file only needs to be converted to the correct encoding once, thereafter it will continue to save in the correct encoding whenever you edit it.

Error Messages

If BOSS can detect a specific reason for being unable to function correctly, it will print an error message detailing the problem. BOSS's error messages are listed below, along with details of the issues and possible solutions.

• Message: No game detected!
  • Issue: Your master .ESM file is deactivated and ghosted by Wrye *ash.
  • Solution: Re-activate your master .ESM file.
  • Issue: BOSS cannot detect any of the supported games.
  • Solution: Install BOSS locally for each of the supported games you have installed. I.e. have a BOSS folder sitting next to the Data folder of each game.
  • Issue: BOSS cannot tell what game it is running for.
  • Solution: This may occur if BOSS has been unable to detect a supported game but it is made to run anyway, eg. by running the GUI with Update Masterlist Only selected but the Active Game set to None. Make sure that you have selected a game to run for or set the active game.
• Message: "filename" cannot be read!
  • Solution: If filename is the masterlist, ensure that the masterlist updater is enabled and run BOSS again to download the masterlist to the correct location.
  • Solution: Ensure filename exists, and that you have read permissions for the file and its parent folders.
• Message: "filename" cannot be written to!
  • Issue: BOSS does not have permission to write to filename if it exists.
  • Solution: Make sure that the file, if it exists, is not read-only, and that you have write permissions. See the File Permissions section for details on how to obtain write permissions on Windows Vista or 7.
• Message: "filename" is not encoded in valid UTF-8!
  • Issue: If filename is "userlist.txt", BOSS has detected that your userlist.txt is saved using the wrong encoding, and is unable to read it.
  • Solution: Re-save the file given in the correct "UTF-8" encoding. If you are unsure on how to do so, follow these instructions:
    1. Open the file in Notepad.
    2. Open the File menu, then select Save As....
    3. In the Save As dialog window that opens, there is a drop-down list labelled Encoding:. Select UTF-8 from this list. Do not select any of the other Unicode encodings, they will not work.
    4. Click the Save button, answering Yes to any confirmation prompts.

    A file only needs to be converted to the correct encoding once, thereafter it will continue to save in the correct encoding whenever you edit it.

  • Issue: If filename is not "userlist.txt", BOSS is not functioning correctly.
  • Solution: Re-save filename in the correct "UTF-8" encoding. Report this issue to the BOSS Development Team.
• Message: "filename" cannot be found!
  • Solution: Ensure filename exists. If filename is a BOSS Log and you are trying to open it from the GUI, make sure that you have run BOSS at least once with it set to generate the format of BOSS Log you are trying to view.
• Message: Master files loading after non-master plugins!
  • Issue: BOSS is trying to set master plugins after non-master plugins in the load order. This won't break anything, because the game always loads masters before non-masters regardless of their load order, but it means that BOSS's output would be incorrect.
  • Solution: If you have ESMified any non-master plugins, ESPify them back again before running BOSS. If you have not ESMified any non-master plugins, or don't know what that means, report this issue to the BOSS Development Team.
• Message: This plugin's internal master bit flag value does not match its file extension. This issue should be reported to the mod's author, and can be fixed by changing the file extension from .esp to .esm or vice versa.
  • Issue: Whether a plugin is a master file or not is not decided by its file extension, but rather by a bit flag within the plugin. Some mod authors do not know this and so attempt to turn plugins into masters or masters into plugins by changing the file's extension. This does not work, and the game will only pay attention to the bit flag value, so it can appear to users that the plugin is loading in one position when it is actually loading on another. BOSS checks for such false-flagged plugins and alerts the user.
  • Solution: Contact the mod author notifying them of the issue politely. The bit flag of a plugin can be changed using Wrye Bash's ESMify/ESPify Self functionality.
• Message: Cannot find online masterlist revision number!
  • Solution: Report this issue to the BOSS Development Team.
• Message: Cannot find online masterlist revision date!
  • Solution: Report this issue to the BOSS Development Team.
• Message: Cannot read list of files to be updated!
  • Solution: Report this issue to the BOSS Development Team.
• Message: Downloaded file "filename" failed verification test!
  • Issue: filename was corrupted during download or the download did otherwise not complete properly.
  • Solution: Try updating again.
• Message: The modification date of "filename" cannot be read! Filesystem response: "further details".
  • Solution: Ensure filename exists, and that you have read permissions for the file and its parent folders.
• Message: "filename" cannot be renamed! Filesystem response: "further details".
  • Solution: Make sure that the file, if it exists, is not read-only, and that you have write permissions. See the File Permissions section for details on how to obtain write permissions on Windows Vista or 7.
• Message: "filename" cannot be deleted! Filesystem response: "further details".
  • Solution: Make sure that the file, if it exists, is not read-only, and that you have write permissions. See the File Permissions section for details on how to obtain write permissions on Windows Vista or 7.
• Message: "directory" cannot be created! Filesystem response: "further details".
  • Solution: Make sure that you have write permissions for the location the directory is being create in. See the File Permissions section for details on how to obtain write permissions on Windows Vista or 7.
• Message: "directory" cannot be scanned! Filesystem response: "further details".
  • Solution: Make sure that you have read permissions for the location that is being scanned. See the File Permissions section for details on how to obtain write permissions on Windows Vista or 7.
• Message: cURL cannot be initialised!
  • Issue: The program that BOSS uses to connect to the Internet could not be initialised.
  • Solution: No specific solution. Try again later.
• Message: cURL's error buffer could not be set! cURL response: "further details".
  • Issue: The error buffer used by the program BOSS uses to connect to the Internet could not be set.
  • Solution: Report this issue to the BOSS Development Team.
• Message: A cURL option could not be set! cURL response: "further details".
  • Issue: Some parameter that is required for BOSS to perform Internet-related tasks could not be set.
  • Solution: Report this issue to the BOSS Development Team.
• Message: Proxy hostname or port invalid! cURL response: "further details".
  • Issue: BOSS was unable to set the given proxy hostname or port number.
  • Solution: Your proxy settings in your BOSS.ini are invalid. Correct them before running BOSS again.
• Message: Failed to set proxy type! cURL response: "further details".
  • Issue: BOSS was unable to automatically determine your proxy type.
  • Solution: Report this issue to the BOSS Development Team.
• Message: Proxy authentication username or password invalid! cURL response: "further details".
  • Issue: BOSS cannot connect to your proxy using the given username and password combination.
  • Solution: Ensure that you have written the correct username and password in your BOSS.ini.
• Message: Failed to set proxy authentication type! cURL response: "further details".
  • Issue: BOSS was unable to automatically determine the type of authentication used by your proxy.
  • Solution: Report this issue to the BOSS Development Team.
• Message: cURL could not perform task! cURL response: "further details".
  • Issue: BOSS could not download a file or perform some other Internet-related task.
  • Solution: Report this issue to the BOSS Development Team.
• Message: Cancelled by user.
  • Issue: You cancelled the process. No issue.
• Message: Parsing of filename failed!
  • Issue: The contents of filename was not in the format the BOSS expected.
  • Solution: BOSS should provide some further information on the nature of the issue. If you have edited the file, use this information to help correct whatever mistake you have made. If you have not edited the file, report this issue to the BOSS Development Team.
• Message: The modification date of "filename" cannot be written!
  • Solution: Make sure that the file, if it exists, is not read-only, and that you have write permissions. See the File Permissions section for details on how to obtain write permissions on Windows Vista or 7.
• Message: No Internet connection detected.
  • Solution: If you are certain that you do have an Internet connection, it could be because you use a proxy to connect to the Internet. Enter your proxy connection details into the relevant parts of the BOSS.ini and try again. If you are unsure whether you are using a proxy and are trying to use BOSS in an enterprise environment, contact your network administrator for your proxy details. If you continue to have difficulty or are not using a proxy, report this issue to the BOSS Development Team.
• Message: file Parsing Error: Expected a string at: block of text. file parsing aborted.
  • Issue: BOSS encountered unexpected formatting in the given file.
  • Solution: If you have edited the file, try using the information on what is expected where to solve the issue. Otherwise, report this issue to the BOSS Development Team.
• Message: Error: details of error Unable to save changes.
  • Issue: BOSS cannot save the changes made to your userlist in the User Rules Editor.
  • Solution: See the details of the error and match them to one of the other above error messages, using its solution to solve the issue.
• Message: Rule Syntax Error: details of error Please correct the mistake before continuing.
  • Issue: You have attempted to save a user rule (edited or created) which contains invalid syntax.
  • Solution: The message will specify the precise fault. Resolve the fault to solve the issue.
• Message: Error: Could not move rule.
  • Solution: Report this issue to the BOSS Development Team.

The following error messages may be produced when a user rule with invalid syntax is encountered. To solve, correct the issue the message highlights. All messages detail the specific fault found.

• Message: Userlist Syntax Error: The rule beginning "rule keyword: rule object" includes a sort line in a rule with a FOR rule keyword.
• Message: Userlist Syntax Error: The rule beginning "rule keyword: rule object" tries to add a group.
• Message: Userlist Syntax Error: The rule beginning "rule keyword: rule object" tries to sort the group "ESMs".
• Message: Userlist Syntax Error: The rule beginning "rule keyword: rule object" tries to sort the master .ESM file.
• Message: Userlist Syntax Error: The rule beginning "rule keyword: rule object" references a mod and a group.
• Message: Userlist Syntax Error: The rule beginning "rule keyword: rule object" tries to sort a group before the group "ESMs".
• Message: Userlist Syntax Error: The rule beginning "rule keyword: rule object" tries to sort a mod before the master .ESM file.
• Message: Userlist Syntax Error: The rule beginning "rule keyword: rule object" tries to insert a mod into the top of the group "ESMs", before the master .ESM file.
• Message: Userlist Syntax Error: The rule beginning "rule keyword: rule object" tries to insert a group or insert something into a mod.
• Message: Userlist Syntax Error: The rule beginning "rule keyword: rule object" tries to attach a message to a group.
• Message: Userlist Syntax Error: The rule beginning "rule keyword: rule object" has more than one sort line.
• Message: Userlist Syntax Error: The rule beginning "rule keyword: rule object" has more than one REPLACE-using message line.
• Message: Userlist Syntax Error: The rule beginning "rule keyword: rule object" has a REPLACE-using message line that is not the first message line.
• Message: Userlist Syntax Error: The rule beginning "rule keyword: rule object" has a sort line that is not the second line of the rule.
• Message: Userlist Syntax Error: The rule beginning "rule keyword: rule object" tries to sort a mod or group relative to itself.
• Message: Userlist Syntax Error: The rule beginning "rule keyword: rule object" tries to sort a master file before a plugin.
• Message: Userlist Syntax Error: The rule beginning "rule keyword: rule object" tries to sort a plugin bfore a master file.

Credits

As BOSS is very much a community project, credit is due to a very large number of sources and people outside of the BOSS Development Team. Credit goes to the following for load order information:

• Agiel's Annotated Load Order.
• Fivefries load order.
• dev_akm's expanded FCOM load order.
• The Martigen's Monster Mod Team.
• The Better Cities developers.
• Many, many modders and users who have posted suggestions and instructions in the BOSS threads and on the Nexus sites.

Some people have gone out of their way and provided continuing, expert and detailed help - thank you very much! In addition to the above, the following are credited with additional application-related support:

• The Wrye Bash Development Team: For implementing the importing of BOSS's Bashed Patch tag suggestions and general support for BOSS into Wrye Bash.
• Surazal: For extensive testing of v1.6+ prior to release and for providing the inspiration for many features through his BOSS Masterlist Manager macro for Microsoft Word.
• myk002: For extensive testing and code contributions during development of v1.6+.
• Hickory: For extensive testing and for providing the icon used by the BOSS and GUI executables.
• The following, for testing and feedback prior to releases:
  • The Beta Testing & Analysis Guild at TES Alliance
  • AndalayBay
  • dj2005
  • Dubiousness
  • saebel
  • Telyn
  • wiz0floyd
  • Ysne58
  • Zanderat

The BOSS programs are written in C/C++ and make use of the Boost, libcurl, wxWidgets and UTF8-CPP libraries. Without them, the majority of BOSS's features would probably never have been implemented.

Project Members

Since June 2009, BOSS has been a collaborative project on Google Code using the Subversion version control system. In alphabetical order, the project members are:

Members with faded rows are currently inactive, with no contributions in the last 3 months. Unless otherwise noted, project members can be contacted on the Bethesda Softworks Forums or on The Nexus Forums via the private messaging system.

License

BOSS is distributed under the GNU General Public License v3.0, aside from the documentation, which is distributed under the GNU Free Documentation License v1.3. The documents covered by the latter license are BOSS ReadMe.html, BOSS User Rules ReadMe.html, BOSS API ReadMe.html and BOSS Masterlist Syntax.html. For the full text of both licenses, see the included Licenses.txt file.

While the GPL license allows anyone to make derivative works of BOSS, the BOSS Development Team encourages those thinking of doing so to first discuss their reasoning for such an endevour with the Team. It may be that what the derivative work would do differently from BOSS itself is already planned for a future version of BOSS or would be happily integrated into BOSS by the Team, thus avoiding any extra effort by others.

The BOSS Team also appeals to the community to avoid the distribution and development of alternative masterlists, as this would only hamper the community effort to create one universally-optimised load order for all plugins available for download. Any issues with a masterlist are best brought to the attention of the BOSS Team so that we may remedy them ourselves.

GNU Free Documentation License Version 1.3 Notice

Copyright (C)  2009-2012  BOSS Development Team
Permission is granted to copy, distribute and/or modify this document
under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License, Version 1.3
or any later version published by the Free Software Foundation;
with no Invariant Sections, no Front-Cover Texts, and no Back-Cover Texts.
A copy of the license is included in the file named "Licenses.txt".

Quick Links

Download Locations

• BOSS at TES Nexus
• BOSS at Skyrim Nexus
• BOSS at Fallout 3 Nexus
• BOSS at New Vegas Nexus

Official Threads

• Official BOSS thread for Oblivion
• Official BOSS thread for Nehrim
• Official BOSS thread for Skyrim
• Official BOSS thread for Fallout 3
• Official BOSS thread for Fallout: New Vegas

Due to a 200 maximum post limit, new official threads are created periodically (with the end of one thread usually providing a link to the next), so the links provided may refer to old threads when you read this. Just navigate through to the latest thread to post a message. You must register for free to post messages.

Other Links

• Google Code SVN repository
• GNU General Public License v3.0
• GNU Free Documentation License v1.3

Version History

The changelogs for each release of BOSS are listed below. The masterlists are updated far too frequently for their changes to be concisely recorded here, but a full history of changes to them may be viewed by browsing the Google Code repository.

Version 2.0.1 - 6 April 2012

• Fixed: Masterlist regular expression errors being reported in an endless loop.
• Fixed: Crash when BOSS is running for Skyrim and plugins.txt is read-only.
• Fixed: Crash when a user rule overrides a masterlist group position.
• Fixed: GUI's User Rules Editor disabling OVERRIDE rules on load.
• Fixed: Plugins referenced in user rules that are not installed getting added to loadorder.txt when running for Skyrim v1.4.26+.
• Fixed: Update.esm not being labelled as active in the BOSS Log when it is missing from plugins.txt and BOSS is running for Skyrim.
• Fixed: Crash when a single non-local game install is detected.
• Fixed: Games that are not installed being detected.
• Changed: Uninstaller's User Files option is now unselected by default.
• Changed: Switched installer from NSIS to NSIS Unicode.
• Added: Russian language option to installer. Translation by Tokc.D.K.

Version 2.0.0 - 27 March 2012

• Removed: BOSS Updater for manual installs. When an update is checked for and found on a manual install, BOSS will notify the user of the update and its download locations, but not download or install the update itself. Behaviour on installer installs is unchanged.
• Removed: iRunType ini setting, as it was unnecessary.
• Fixed: GUI mixing up Nehrim and Fallout: New Vegas in the Game drop-down box.
• Fixed: Masterlist parser getting confused when a plugin filename shared starting characters with a keyword.
• Fixed: Invalid regular expressions in masterlist-format files causing crashes.
• Fixed: Plugins with filenames containing international characters causing the GUI's User Rules Editor to fail to load.
• Fixed: Masterlist-format files beginning with blank lines will no longer create an initial empty item in their data structures.
• Fixed: The tooltip intended for the new messages text box was attached to the masterlist mod messages box in the User Rules Editor.
• Fixed: The masterlist displayed GUI's User Rules Editor was unevaluated for conditionals and regex entries.
• Fixed: Saving a masterlist-format file no longer omits its conditionals. This bug was never exposed.
• Fixed: Conditional parsing errors not being reported correctly in the BOSS Log. This bug was never exposed.
• Fixed: Messages being outputted in the format set globally instead of the outputters local format. This bug was never exposed.
• Fixed: Version number comparisons being sometimes evaluated wrongly for versions of the form a.b.c.d where a, b, c and d were integers. This bug was never exposed.
• Changed: This utility's name has been changed from Better Oblivion Sorting Software to BOSS.
• Changed: Tidied up code, making better use of class inheritance and swapping Boost filesystem paths for strings in plugin names.
• Changed: Updated libcurl from 7.23.1 to 7.25.0, wxWidgets from 2.9.2 to 2.9.3, and Boost from 1.48.0 to 1.49.0.
• Changed: GUI's User Rules Editor is now resizeable and the Installed Mods and Masterlist lists are now tabbed to give them more space.
• Changed: The GUI now uses the User Rules Editor to edit the userlist by default.
• Changed: Only a single instance of the GUI is now allowed to run at any one time.
• Changed: BOSS no longer quits with an error message without sorting plugins when both Nehrim.esm and Oblivion.esm are present in the same Data folder, as this arrangement may be valid for modders porting mods, so long as Oblivion.esm remains inactive when Nehrim is run.
• Changed: BOSS update release notes are now displayed before the update download confirmation.
• Changed: Pretty pictures now in the main readme! Also updated content to reflect various changes and additions.
• Changed: Rewrote NSIS installer to reflect various changes and additions, and simplified the installer code greatly.
• Changed: You can no longer sort non-master plugins before master plugins, or master plugins after non-master plugins, using user rules. Masters are commonly .ESM files, and non-master plugins are commonly .ESP files, but whether a plugin is a master or not is actually decided by a variable in the file, not the file extension. (An example of this in action would be Wrye *ash's ESMify Self function, which makes a plugin into a master without changing the file extension.)
• Changed: BOSS now enforces the game's masters before plugins rule for load ordering when reading the current load order and sorting plugins.
• Added: Support for multiple games from a single BOSS install:
  • BOSS now has two different install types: local installs place the BOSS folder beside a game's Data folder. Non-local installs place the BOSS folder anywhere else. Local installs will always run for the local game by default. Non-local installs will look for supported games and prompt the user to choose one to run for each time BOSS is run. If only one game is found, BOSS will run for it without user prompt.
  • BOSS game files (masterlist, BOSS Log, etc.) are now stored in separate sub-folders within the BOSS folder for each game to avoid conflict.
  • The --game,-g [ game ] command line parameter and corresponding ini and GUI settings now behaves slightly differently: when BOSS is run with the game not set to autodetect, and it is not set to only update the masterlist, the game parameter specifies the default game to run for. If the default cannot be found, BOSS falls back to autodetection.
  • The GUI now prompts the user to choose which game it should run for on startup. Games that are not detected are selectable, but will only allow their masterlists to be updated.
  • The Game drop-down list in the GUI has been moved to the Settings window.
  • An Active Game menu has been added to the GUI that allows you to change which game BOSS is currently active for without closing the GUI. Undetected games are greyed out, unless the Update Masterlist Only run option is selected. If you have an undetected game active and switch from Update Masterlist Only to another run option, the BOSS automatically switches to the first detected game in the list.
• Added: BOSS API for use by third party utilities to access BOSS information and functionality. See BOSS API ReadMe for details.
• Added: BOSS can now read the plugins.txt file that the supported games use to store their active plugin list in. BOSS also adapts to the value of the bUseMyGamesDirectory setting in Oblivion.ini when running for Oblivion.
• Added: An Active label to the BOSS Log for plugins that are active when BOSS is run, and Hide Inactive Mods and Hide 'Active' Label BOSS Log filters.
• Added: Support for the load order mechanism used by TES V: Skyrim version 1.4.26+. This outputs load order of active plugins to plugins.txt, and outputs the full load order to loadorder.txt, which is created in the same directory as plugins.txt.
• Added: BOSS now checks for false-flagged plugins and moves any found to the correct side of the master/non-master partition. False-flagged plugins are those with an extension that does not match the state of the plugin's internal master bit flag.

Version 1.9.1 - 1 January 2012

• Fixed: Mods in the last group of a masterlist being unrecognised when one or more user rules were enabled.
• Fixed: Masterlist-format files saved by BOSS that contain messages cannot be loaded successfully by BOSS. This bug was never exposed.
• Fixed: Every second link in a message displayed in the BOSS Log not being displayed as a hyperlink when using the HTML BOSS Log.
• Fixed: MF1 legacy conditionals always being evaluated for Oblivion, even when BOSS was run for other games.
• Fixed: Masterlist parsing errors were not correctly reported in the BOSS Log.
• Fixed: BOSS Updater version checking not returning correct result with some versions.
• Changed: Masterlist conditional evaluation now occurs separately from masterlist parsing.
• Changed: BOSS Log's Unrecognised Plugins section is now only displayed if there are any unrecognised plugins present.
• Changed: Some tidying up of the BOSS Log text and formatting.
• Changed: Code type safety work. BOSS can now be built to 32 and 64 bit binaries, although 64 bit binaries will not be distributed.
• Changed: Copyright license is now GNU General Public License v3.0 for everything but the documentation, and GNU Free Documentation License v1.3 for the documentation.
• Changed: Updated version of libcurl used from 7.22.0 to 7.23.1, and updated version of Boost libraries used from 1.47.0 to 1.48.0.
• Changed: Expanded/Collapsed indicators added for masterlist groups in the GUI's User Rules Editor.
• Changed: GUI's User Rules Editor will now auto-scroll the rule list so that the currently selected rule is visible whenever the rule list is altered.

Version 1.9 - 13 November 2011

• Changed: Major refactoring of BOSS code into a common library, a Command Line Interface and a Graphical User Interface.
• Common Library:
  • Removed: Checking for changes to the recognised mod list since last run for the plain text BOSS Log, as this did not work correctly and is not feasible to fix.
  • Removed: Command line parameter -T [ --proxy-type ] [ type ] and BOSS.ini setting sProxyType Internet proxy type specification options. Proxy type is now automatically determined.
  • Fixed: A bug where if a plugin filename started with "SET" or "GLOBAL" (or case variations) then BOSS would incorrectly classify it as a variable or global message line and so result in syntax errors.
  • Fixed: User Rules which failed to add a plugin into the beginning or end of a group still incremented the number of recognised plugins as if the rule application had succeeded.
  • Fixed: Userlist rules which reference plugins that are not installed now have warning messages reported instead of error messages.
  • Fixed: Masterlist conditions now detect ghosted mods correctly.
  • Fixed: The online Fallout: New Vegas masterlist's revision being checked instead of the online Fallout 3 masterlist's revision when updating the Fallout 3 masterlist.
  • Fixed: The Hide Messageless Mods BOSS Log filter not acting when another filter resulted in all a mod's messages being hidden.
  • Fixed: The last group of mods in a masterlist being unrecognised.
  • Changed: More robust error handling.
  • Changed: User rules can now only use up to one sort line and/or one REPLACE message line per rule, and cannot sort mods/groups relative to themselves.
  • Changed: Updated version of libcurl used when building BOSS.exe and BOSS GUI.exe to 7.22.0 from 7.21.7.
  • Changed: Content and slight formatting changes to BOSS Log:
    • Masterlist Update section removed. Update information is now displayed in the Summary section. Updater errors are displayed in the General Messages section.
    • Javascript optimisations for filters.
    • Execution Complete text is now centred.
    • All BOSS Log output now has special characters escaped so that it is valid HTML.
    • The date of the user's masterlist is now displayed in the Summary.
    • Ini parsing errors are now displayed in the General Messages section.
    • The filters are now laid out in a more grid-like fashion.
    • Added whitespace characters between plugin filenames, versions, ghosted labels and CRCs to make copy/pasted text more readable.
    • Coloured links in the dark colour scheme so that they are easier to read.
    • The number of plugins and messages hidden at any one time is displayed below the filters box in italics.
    • The Script Extender And Script Extender Plugins section is now always displayed, with CRCs only being calculated if the Display File CRCs option is set.
  • Changes to BOSS.ini variables:
    • Removed GUI.Settings and GUI.LastOptions sections.
    • DoStartupUpdateCheck moved to a new BOSS.GeneralSettings section.
    • Removed DisableMasterlistUpdate setting.
    • Added variable type prefixes to variable names (s, i, b).
    • Boolean variables now accept true or false instead of 1 or 0.
    • CommandLineVerbosity renamed to iDebugVerbosity.
    • Debug renamed to bDebugWithSourceRefs.
    • Added bLogDebugOutput setting to BOSS.RunOptions to control the logging of debugging output.
    • Added bUseUserRulesEditor setting to BOSS.GeneralSettings to control how to the GUI chooses to edit user rules.
    • Default values for the BOSSLog.Styles settings are now given, and values are no longer enclosed in {} brackets.
  • Changed: Major rewrite of most of the common code, including more object-orientation of code, removal of some unused functions, implementation of an class for formatted output using generic placeholders and much more.
  • Added: Hide Clean Mods and Hide 'Do Not Clean' Messages BOSS Log filters.
  • Added: Support for TES V: Skyrim and the Skyrim Script Extender.
  • Added: Support for MF2.2 syntax, including C-style comments, regular expression conditions, case-insensitive keywords and expanded conditional shorthands.
  • Added: Built-in debug output logging support.
  • Added: DISABLE keyword to user rules that can be placed before a rule's rule keyword to disable it, instead of commenting it out to do the same.
  • Added: Support for authenticated proxies, using the sProxyUsername and sProxyPassword BOSS.ini settings.
    • Note that the support is untested. Feedback from users with authenticated proxies would be appreciated.
• Command Line Interface:
  • Changed: The command line parameter --debug, -d is now --debug-with-source, -d.
  • Added: Progress indication for downloads.
  • Added: A new command line parameter log-debug, -l to allow logging of the debug output to the BOSSDebugLog.txt file.
  • Added: BOSS Updater functionality.
• Graphical User Interface:
  • Added: A User Rules Editor to allow creation and editing of user rules without manually editing the userlist.txt.
  • Changed: The GUI is now completely independent of the CLI interface.
  • Changed: Settings window overhauled:
    • Debugging-related settings moved to the from the main window.
    • Settings catagorised into tabs.
    • Added settings for controlling the default state of the BOSS Log filters and the BOSS Log CSS.
    • Added a Log Debug Output setting to allow logging of the debug output to the BOSSDebugLog.txt file.
    • Added an option to select whether to use the GUI's User Rule Editor or to manually edit the userlist when editing user rules.
    • Updated proxy settings to reflect changes to proxy support.
  • Changed: Simplified layout of main window options.
  • Changed: Renamed some options to reflect their functions better.
  • Changed: Opening files from the GUI no longer causes a command line window to display.
  • Changed: The Check For Updates feature no longer causes the GUI to stop responding, either run on startup or through the menu option.
• (Installer) Changed: Updated to support Skyrim.
• (Docs) Changed: Major updates to main readme to reflect changes.
• (Docs) Added: Masterlist Syntax HTML documentation for BOSS team members and interested third parties.

Version 1.8 - 6 July 2011

• Fixed: Junction-linked data folders not being scanned for plugins.
• Fixed: Links being displayed incorrectly in the BOSS Log if more than one was given in a message.
• Changed: Masterlist updater now runs by default.
• Changed: Updated version of libcurl used when building BOSS.exe and BOSS GUI.exe to 7.21.7 from 7.21.4.
• Changed: Overhauled the Plugin Numbers section of the BOSS Log:
  • Moved the section to the top of the BOSS Log.
  • Renamed the section from Plugin Numbers to Summary.
  • Added message counts, with numbers of total messages, warning messages and error messages.
  • Added a notice that is displayed when there has been no change in the recognised plugin list since BOSS was last run.
• Added: A settings file (BOSS.ini) to allow users to set default behaviours, options and BOSS Log formatting styles.
• Added: Support for unauthenticated proxies to the masterlist updater and the GUI's Check For Updates functionality.
• Added: Five new command line parameters:
  • --proxy-host,-H [ hostname ] to specify a proxy's host server for the masterlist updater.
  • --proxy-port,-P [ port ] to specify a proxy's port for the masterlist updater.
  • --proxy-type,-T [ type ] to specify a proxy type for the masterlist updater.
  • --trial-run,-t to run BOSS without actually changing the load order.
  • --no-update,-U to inhibit automatic masterlist updating.
• Added: Support for Fallout: New Vegas plugins that use the Fallout 3 master file, such as A Requiem for the Capital Wasteland.
• Added: Support for MF2.1 regular expressions, conditional incompatibility and conditional requirement messages in the masterlist.
• Added: BOSS Log filter option to hide userlist warning messages.
• (GUI) Fixed: The Enable File CRC Display and Enable Mod Version Display options getting confused between their values under the Sort Mods and Undo Changes run options.
• (GUI) Fixed: The icon not appearing in the title bar.
• (GUI) Fixed: The GUI hanging when BOSS is launched.
• (GUI) Changed: The Masterlist Update checkbox now sets the --no-update command line parameter if unchecked to override BOSS's default behaviour.
• (GUI) Changed: The look of the About window.
• (GUI) Changed: Overhauled the Check For Updates functionality:
  • Removed the masterlist update checker, as it has been made redundant by BOSS's automatic masterlist updating.
  • Added automatic updater functionality. Replaced Check For Updates output window with a series of notification dialogs asking if the update should be downloaded and installed. If no update was found, or there was an error, relevant dialog messages are displayed.
  • Check For Updates now also automatically runs when the GUI starts. This only displays a message if an update was found.
• (GUI) Changed: Renamed a number of options, simplifying their names slightly.
• (GUI) Changed: Options selected are now saved on exit and loaded on start.
• (GUI) Added: Perform Trial Run option.
• (GUI) Added: Settings page for specifying how the GUI behaves.
• (Installer) Changed: Updated to reflect various changes to programs.
• (Installer) Changed: Installer now runs uninstaller before installing if a previous installation of BOSS is found.
• (Docs) Changed: Significant content and formatting changes to main ReadMe, slight formatting changes to User Rules readme.

Version 1.7 - 10 June 2011

• Fixed: A bug in the masterlist updater causing the wrong masterlist version to be displayed.
• Changed: Ghosted plugins must now be referenced in user rules without their ".ghost" extension.
• Changed: Moved all BOSS's files into a new BOSS folder, located in the game's installation directory, one level above the Data folder.
• Changed: Switched to using the Unicode character encoding, allowing the sorting of plugins with international characters in their names.
  • BOSS now uses the UTF-8 encoding for all its operations.
  • All BOSS files must now be encoded in UTF-8: this includes the modlists, masterlist and userlist.
  • Converted the masterlists and modlists to use the UTF-8 encoding.
  • Added a UTF-8 validator to ensure that the correct encoding for the required files is being used.
• Changed: Removed batch files as they are no longer necessary.
• Changed: The release date of updated masterlists is now displayed beside the revision number in the BOSS Log.
• Changed: Significant rewrite of source code, resulting in performance gains.
• Changed: Implemented new file parsers for the masterlist, modlists and userlist.
• Changed: Improved the formatting of the BOSS Log, making it more readable.
• Changed: Links in the BOSS Log are now hyperlinks that can be clicked on to take you to the given URL.
• Added: A unique icon to the executables, made by Hickory.
• Added: Support for Masterlist Format 2, which offers an alternative syntax and a wide range of new features and capabilities.
• Added: Display of the numbers of recognised, unrecognised, ghosted and total plugins to the end of the BOSS Log.
• Added: Javascript-based filter options and collapsible sections to the BOSS Log.
• Added: A Graphical User Interface (GUI) that can be used to launch BOSS with whatever options are desired without having to use the command line.
• Added: Three new command line parameters:
  • --game,-g [ game ] to override game autodetection. To be used in conjunction with -o to allow updating of the masterlist on computers where the specified game is not installed.
  • --crc-display,-c to calculate and display in the BOSS Log the CRCs of all your plugins. CRCs can be used as accurate version checks in masterlist conditionals.
  • --format,-f [ type ] to select the BOSS Log format, choosing from either HTML or plaintext. HTML formatting is the default.
• (Installer) Changed: Updated installer to reflect the various changes to BOSS's files and folders.
• (Docs) Changed: Significant content and formatting changes to main ReadMe, slight formatting changes to User Rules readme.

Version 1.6.5 - 1 December 2010

• Fixed: Userlist parser giving incorrect error messages for rules inserting plugins into groups.
• Fixed: BOSS reporting some plugins as unknown when they are ghosted.

Version 1.6.4 - 28 November 2010

• Fixed: Keywords, plugins and groups in user rules being unrecognised if they are padded by spaces.
• Fixed: Non-ASCII characters in plugin filenames causing crashes.
• Changed: Slight improvements to user rule error reporting when sorting groups that do not exist.
• Added: --only-update,-o command line parameter to only update the masterlist without then sorting any plugins.
• Added: BOSS - Print Debug Info.bat file to make debugging of BOSS errors simpler.
• Added: Nullsoft Scriptable Install installer for simpler BOSS installation.

Version 1.6.3 - 15 November 2010

• Fixed: Crashing when updating the masterlist if downloading an incorrectly formatted masterlist.
• Fixed: Plugins with duplicate masterlist entries causing load order errors.
• Fixed: Another crash when parsing an incorrectly formatted userlist.
• Changed: User rule keywords are now case-insensitive.
• Changed: User rules can no longer sort a plugin relative to a plugin that is not in the masterlist and has not been sorted by another rule.
• Added: Check to userlist application of override rules to prevent incorrect usage resulting in load order errors.

Version 1.6.2 - 1 November 2010

• Fixed: Crashing when userlist contains badly formatted lines.
• Changed: Many code portability enhancements.
• Changed: Command line parameters to be more standardised:
  • --disable-version-parse,-V is now --no-version-parse,-n.
  • --silent-mode,-s is now --silent,-s.
  • --revert-level,-r [ level ] is now --revert,-r [ level ].
• Added: Support for Fallout: New Vegas.
• Added: Ability to insert plugins into groups to user rules functionality.
• Added: Ability to sort plugins relative to plugins that are not installed, but are in the masterlist, to user rules functionality.
• Added: Three new command line parameters:
  • --verbose,-v [ level ] to enable logging statements, where level goes from 1 to 3 with increasing verbosity.
  • --version,-V to show BOSS version.
  • --debug,-d to add filename and line numbers to log messages.

Version 1.6.1 - 19 October 2010

• Fixed: Non-lowercase plugin extensions not being recognised and causing crashes and load order mistakes.
• Fixed: A potential bug with the masterlist updater causing memory issues.
• Fixed: Several compiler warnings when compiling on Linux.
• Changed: Increased timout delay for the masterlist updater to prevent the updater failing when Google Code is slow.
• Changed: Improved masterlist updater error handling.
• Added: --silent,-s command line parameter to suppress the automatic opening of the BOSS Log when BOSS is run.
• Added: Version info to BOSS.exe to make Wrye Bash integration/debugging easier.

Version 1.6 - 8 October 2010

• Fixed: Fallout3.esm being reported as an 'unknown mod file'.
• Changed: Removed need for BOSS.bat.
• Changed: Moved BOSS's input and output files to Data\BOSS\.
• Changed: Converted BOSS Log from plain text to HTML format.
• Changed: Improved error handling to catch more errors and provide more useful error messages when BOSS doesn't work properly.
• Changed: Improved portability of source code.
• Changed: Merged BOSS and BOSS-F source code, allowing one BOSS.exe to work with all the games BOSS supports.
• Changed: Major refactoring and rewrite of BOSS source code, resulting in a significant performance improvement.
• Added: Fallout Wanderers Edition (FWE) specific message type for the Fallout 3 masterlist.
• Added: Plugin version display to BOSS Log output.
• Added: Three new command line parameters:
  • --update,-u to update the masterlist before sorting plugins.
  • --disable-version-parse,-V to disable version display in the BOSS Log.
  • --revert-level,-r [ level ] to allow undoing of BOSS's changes. level can be either 1 or 2, to go back to the load order before the last run of BOSS, or the load order before the run before that respectively.
• Added: BOSS - Update Masterlist.bat file to allow updating of the masterlist without having to use the command line.
• Added: Sorting of ghosted plugins.
• Added: Custom user rules functionality to allow users to customise how BOSS sorts their files, and more.
• Added: Support for the Nehrim - At Fate's Edge total conversion for TES IV: Oblivion.
• (Docs) Changed: Converted Readme from RTF to HTML format.

Version 1.5 - 24 March 2010

• Changed: Switched source code project and solution files to Visual Studio 2010.
• Added: Four new message types:
  • OOO-specific messages.
  • Requirement messages.
  • Incompatibility messages.
  • Better Cities-specific messages.
• Added: A separate masterlist for Fallout 3.
• Added: A version of BOSS specifically for Fallout 3 (BOSS-F).

Version 1.4.1 - 31 August 2009

• Fixed: Incorrect master file defined for Fallout 3.
• Fixed: Error messages not being displayed on some machines.

Versions 1.0 - 1.3.5 - 22 October 2008 to 24 June 2009

• Changes Not Recorded.